Hold a True and Right View
Above all, you must gain one true and right view. Only then are you free, unswayed by the world.
Do I see the world through a view others set for me, or through one I have honed myself?
📝Reflection
What Linji stressed most to his disciples was not mystical experience or splendid attainment but a "true and right view." With just one eye that can see the world rightly, you are unswayed in any situation. We are forever shaken: if others call something good, it looks good; if it is in fashion, we follow; if authority speaks, we accept without doubt. The root of all that shaking is the lack of one's own right view. A view does not arise overnight. It firms up only after long honing — seeing for oneself, undergoing, doubting, and seeing again. The freedom Linji spoke of is not the license to do anything. It is the unshakenness that comes from an eye able to discern for itself what is true. One right view frees a person more than a hundred arts of worldly maneuvering.
🌱Apply It Today
Before accepting any information or opinion today, ask once: "Is this a conclusion I weighed myself, or merely a borrowed view?" That single check sharpens your eye.
This verse is read as universal humanistic wisdom, not religion — no faith is promoted, and the reflection is 100% original ONGO content.
